Trump says he could meet Putin even if Russian leader won’t sit down with Ukraine’s Zelensky
The US president said, however, that he was ‘disappointed’ with Putin’s behaviour, and left open the possibility of new penalties for Russia
US President Donald Trump said he would be willing to meet with Vladimir Putin, even if the Russian leader had not yet agreed to also sit down with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The signal from Trump suggested an increased willingness to grant the Kremlin’s request for a one-on-one meeting. But the US president said he was “very disappointed” with Putin’s behaviour and left open the possibility of additional penalties over the war in Ukraine as soon as Friday.
“I don’t like long waits,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. “They would like to meet with me and I will do whatever I can to stop the killing.”
Trump’s remarks overrode earlier comments by a White House official who had said that any meeting between the US president and Putin would only occur if the Russian leader had agreed also to meet with Zelensky. The Kremlin has said officials are finalising details for a meeting within the next few days.
The US and Russia have agreed on a venue for a meeting between their leaders, to be disclosed later, and “we are starting to work on specific issues”, with the aim of holding the talks next week, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters on Thursday.
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Trump threatens Russia with 100% ‘secondary’ tariffs if no deal on Ukraine ceasefire
Putin on Thursday told reporters he did not object to meeting Zelensky under the right conditions, though he said they did not currently exist.